– Gogu Shyamala

Historically, dalits have constantly waged a battle against the false epics, literary and art forms and propaganda of Manuvaada. In another direction, dalit literature has continually exposed Brahminism’s vile lust for dalit blood. In addition, this literature has immediately unmasked Manuvaada in various theories and political practices. Dalit literature works in society by constantly interrogating the dominant ideology with a new consciousness, and thus with its own renaissance, drives society in more egalitarian directions. Finally, Dalit literature stands as the foremost among equals representing bahujan society as an alternate force to Brahminical Hinduism’s patriarchy and its literature.

In modern Telugu literature, dalit poets express the daily diversity of ideological, linguistic forms from their own world view. That is why, we may observe that if one literary world describes this as native, indigenous or bahujan (peoples’) literature, the hegemonic literary world calls it velivaada (outcaste ghetto), marginalized, lower caste, under class, or untouchable literature.

Dalit Literature and Language

Dalit poetry is full of diversity. In studying this poetry it is necessary to focus on language. These poets have given priority to their respective regions, land, water, biodiversity and specificity, production, natural resources, occupational implements, community and family. They have used, and continue to use language which reflects this priority. Dalit poets, in their literary forms, have included the perspectives of social, economic, cultural identities of their waadas (locality specific to communities such as Maala, Maadiga, Begari, Baindla, Chindu, Dakkali, Manyam, Nethakani, Pambala, Budugajangalu, Maasti), and family, as themes in the composition of their poetry. We could say that the specific idiom of these lived practices flows into their poetry. Importantly, the poet’s world view reflects the idiom of the families whose lives simmer in waadas branded by untouchability and oppression, and thus questions the ideology of the agrahara in literature from a fundamentally different perspective.

In this broad context, we can now look at the philosophy, use and expression of language in the following example. Endluri Sudhakar writes “Poetry is the secret skin of my community’s occupation/I cannot touch only a single object/I cannot stitch only one kind of shoe/Oh you bat, to your feet and my poetry I fit a new pair”, and brings his poem “New Bat” into a new flow.

In the process of dalit literary formation, it must be said that language plays a key role. We also see dalit poets use specific names for their literary use of language. As part of this, they call it variously “language of mud”, “black language”, “crow language”, “earth language”, “language of the tanning tank”, “language crackling underfoot”, etc. Thus, it is necessary to do a comparative study between language and literature of aboriginal people, and caste Hindu language. The most important thing to mark is that recent research has uncovered oral literature as the basis for modern dalit language, literature and expression. It is necessary to conduct research on the following aspects of dalit literary language.

Rejecting Hindu principles

If we examine dalit literature, we observe that all these poets, reject Brahminical cultural principles and standards. This is the reason why Pydee Teresh Babu, referring to the outpouring of Dalit agony in the grip of the Hindu caste system, says, “the alphabet were purified as they fell in the fire that burns in our stomachs”. “With a leather knife, will I write an epic poem on hide”, swore Madduri Nagesh Babu. In his “Panchama Vedam”, Satish Chander challenged the Hindu bhasha praveens (advanced scholars of language), “That the four verses shall not mingle was yesterday’s grammar/Words that touched the fifth tongue were never written/Trampling on the verb, Manu became the greatest poet/Fear not, O non-scholars of language/Lines that elope kick away the grammatical families you have built/They migrate to waadas without caste boundaries”.

The difference between Dalit and caste Hindu language, or the structure of criticism of the Puranic figures and legends, are clearly seen in Sivasagar’s “History as it Moves”. “With a smile on his lips, Shambuka/Kills Rama/Ekalavya chops off Drona’s thumb with an axe/Bali, with his small feet/stamps Vamana into hell/Manu stabs needles into his eyes/Cuts off his tongue/Pours lead into his ears/Rolls on the cremation ground. What is happening now is the great Chandala (subaltern) history”.

Dalit history and hegemonic history

It we examine the history of language, as part rewriting the language of power, as part questioning this language, at the same time as part reconstructing dalit history, we see that both in the past and in contemporary times, language plays a major role. Just as “As time flows, new rhythms follow new paths”, language took fresh steps. Mothkuri Johnson’s play Maatanga Emperor Veerabaahu, is a living proof of this process.

Johnson’s play is set in the context of the kingdoms under the rule of the Maatanga kings, which have been written about in the Puranas. Samrat Veerabaahu is one such Matanga king. Harishchandra (Translator: the mythical king who was hailed as the paragon of truth) was in debt-bondage to the sage Vishwamitra. In order to free him, Veerabaahu pays the necessary money to Vishwamitra and purchases Harishchandra. In the context of this slave purchase, there develops an interesting conversation between Harishchandra and Veerabaahu and his courtiers. One of Veerabaahu’s ministers asks Harishchandra:

Minister: Wouldn’t it have been possible to rule the people as one unit, rather than separate them into castes?

Harishchandra: Oh great minister, it is a matter of survival. We may defeat you with plan, plot, timing, strategy, fraud or modern weapons, but we can’t with our power and the strength of our people, can we oh my lord? What is our strength against your people’s strength?

In Vidheeshaka’s retort to this, “As lumps of clay in heaps of grain!”, we must examine specially the language of analogy. It implies that Vidheeshaka, belonging to the ruling elite as a Maatanga, retained touch with the common language and metaphor of agriculture, because he retained contact with agriculture as an occupation.

Before buying Harishchandra as a slave in order to free him from bondage, the Maatanga King Veerabaahu, his queen, courtiers, ministers, poets and the advisor Videeshaka put him in the dock with their questions. Answering these questions, Harischandra, on his own, reveals and describes the many lies he had told, and his reasons for telling them, and in effect confesses to them too. As a result of this, the poet Mothukuri Johnson retelling the tale of the Harischandra the True, turns history we know upside down, and shows him up as Harischandra the Liar.

Crow poets and Koel poets

When we study examples of the contrasts between poets who write with brahminical ideology, and those who write with a dalit perspective, the Hindu poet will describe a tall man as a ‘temple pillar’, while the Dalit poet will describe him as a ‘toddy palm’ or a ‘date palm’. In another example, a loafer will be described by the dalit poet, as ‘one who roams without labour or lyric (pani paata lekunda tirugevaadu)’ while the Hindu poet will describe him as ‘one who roams without studies or salutations (chaduvu sandhya lekunda tirugevaadu). Dalit literature is full of such differences in language, if we search for them. It is also necessary to speak here about, Johnson’s poem “Crow”. In this poem the poet describes and delineates the main difference between the crow and the koel.

What O poet is the koel’s nature?
Giving birth to their young, flinging them at the nursemaid’s face
Sikhandish women who crawl pubs coolly sans motherhood
Throwing into my nest eggs they cannot hatch.
The warmth within my feathers,
Breathing life into new generations on the path into light
Is this my nature, or the koel’s?

What O poet is nature?
Ignorant of the field
Unacquainted with hardship
Collecting the crop grown by ten others
Into her bag, as rich lords do
Coming only in springtime
To gobble up the tenderest shoots
Puffing with arrogance, the discordant shrieks of the koel’s songs,
Become poems for your pen.

Looked at as language or as choice of theme, or as the difference between the crow and the koel, Johnson gives us an inescapable analysis, through which the crow that was once an object of meanness and disgust for many people now commands increased respect. Beyond this, poets in cine and literary fields differentiated themselves into ‘crow’ poets and ‘koel’ poets. This expression of their difference is no small matter.

Dalit writers have created a language which rejects untouchability and slavery, and are putting it to use. They are exploring this language in their writing and speech. They are using this language specially in all villages including in Telangana, because exclusion, untouchability, bondage and atrocities have been perennial in history and continue in new forms today.

 

Translated by Gogu Shyamala and R Srivatsan

How English language becomes as a tool of discrimination in the University

Mirapa Madhavi

In Central Universities like the University of Hyderabad, English as the medium of instruction becomes imperative as there are students from different regions in the country as well as international students. It is the only link language that enables them to connect.

Dalit students face several problems due to their inability to speak in English: inability to mingle with other students; to interact with teachers in the class room, take notes or follow the lectures. However when the ability to communicate in English is taken as a measure of the academic ability of the students many Dalit students end up facing serious problems in their career. Their knowledge of the subject in their native tongue or the ability to articulate responses in the same are hardly considered worthwhile. Often lack of English bars them from articulating their positions. This reinforces the general perception that the Dalit students are without merit, ignorant and unfit for the University. That they could not have reached without ‘reservations’.  ‘English complex’ in the academia fosters a phobia about university education among Dalit students. Taking this as the excuse, upper caste teachers continue to treat them with prejudice and even insult them. Such attitudes have infected some Dalit faculty also in the recent times.

Even though the UGC mandated remedial classes are run for the students from non-English medium backgrounds, there is a mismatch between the expectation of the students and what is being offered. While the students want the ‘remedial English’ to help them understand the classroom lectures, remedial classes are oriented towards teaching them ‘language’.  Students say that these two forms of English are quite different.  Further the fear of being ‘identified’ as Dalits in the campus also prevents students from attending them.

Dalit students adopt various strategies to learn English: interacting with only such people who speak in English; reading English newspapers and news channels; using dictionaries, taking classes from seniors. Some take learning English as a challenge while some see it as a problem. The former seem to fare better compared to the latter.

From the Short Term Fellowship report of M Madhavi on problems faced by Dalit students in the University of Hyderabad.  Excerpted and translated by A Suneetha.

Mirapa Madhavi is  PhD Student at UoH.